IMO it is more a disconnect with the large percent of poor in NO than racism. The two just so happen to be related. Nonetheless, this just shows the cr@p that gets dished out, and if it backfires on the likes of Bush (and his brain Rove) it is deserved. The folks in the south can see that the far right does not and never has represented them.

IMO it is more a disconnect with the large percent of poor in NO than racism. The two just so happen to be related. Nonetheless, this just shows the cr@p that gets dished out, and if it backfires on the likes of Bush (and his brain Rove) it is deserved. The folks in the south can see that the far right does not and never has represented them.

Yeah, I think it's a lot of both. Both classism and racism. But I see a lot of people freely admit it's classism (as if that's any better) and pretend that the racism doesn't exist.

IMO it is more a disconnect with the large percent of poor in NO than racism. The two just so happen to be related. Nonetheless, this just shows the cr@p that gets dished out, and if it backfires on the likes of Bush (and his brain Rove) it is deserved. The folks in the south can see that the far right does not and never has represented them.

How so? The Southern US is very conservative and a primary constituency of the far right.

In the century after the American Civil War and Reconstruction, Southerners often identified with the then-conservative Democratic Party. This lock on power was so strong the region was politically called the Solid South.

In the last thirty-five years, though, this has changed because of Democratic Party support for the civil rights movement and the conservative realignment of the Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan presidencies in the 1970s and 1980s. As a result, the Republican Party has benefited from Southern support, in large measure due to the evangelical Christian vote.

Although the South as a whole defies stereotyping, it is nonetheless known for entrenched conservatism. Support for such conservative causes is often found in the South, including resistance to same-sex marriage and abortion while in the past there was major resistance to feminism, desegregation, the abolition of slavery and interracial marriage.

Louisiana's population is 32% african american. Third only to DC and Mississippi. 27% of the vote was from black voters.

Bush had an 8 point lead over Kerry in louisiana. He pulled 10% of the black vote in louisiana and kerry pulled 90%.

Other numbers on the demographics: http://www.jointcenter.org/publications1/publication-PDFs/BlackVote.pdf [Broken]

These are more democratic friendly than I had thought - I thought even the black vote went to Bush nowadays.

Separately to TRCSF: Yeah, I think it's classism and not racism. I grew up in an area with poor white folks who hated blacks. I saw their attitude towards blacks and it was horrific - along the lines of dragging them behind pickups because they were black.

If this hurricane had hit where I grew up, the white poor people would have been forgotten as easily as the poor black people (who have not been tied up to pickups and dragged around) were forgotten.

The reason I think it is important to make the distinction between classism of this nature and racism, is that nothing we saw in NO that the impoverished blacks suffered was anything like the horrific treatment blacks would have received where I grew up decades ago. But it is exactly like the treatment poor whites would have received.

So: (1) it is much less pointed and hateful than the sort of racism that we have seen historically, thus the term doesn't really "fit" and (2) poverty seems sufficient to explain it.

It seems like a distionction worth pointing out. We *HAVE* made strides in combatting racism. There is a hell of a long way to go.

That's right, the pagans and the feminists are the reason. Or as Lewis Black says, God looked down and saw no stew on the stove, the spice rack in disarray, and said, I shall smite thee. :rofl: Better yet, as Jon Stewart says, in the aftermath of Katrina, Bush is suggesting a day of prayer. But, er um, isn't a hurricane an act of God?

Yeh, okay, Falwell, Limbaugh, Bush, whatever... :yuck:

Edit: Minorites have been traditionally Dem, but the south is a bit of the Bible belt. More blacks voted for Bush than in the past for religious reasons, no?

Hmmm so if there was an educated white mayor in No and the people most effected by the disaster were poor whites, would Limbaugh have called the mayor white trash?? I doubt it.

It was a racist comment. It was meant to be racist under the guise of a slip of the tongue and all of the classist spin can't change that. So what will happen? Rush will go back to his racist audience and continue spewing the same old garbage.

Separately to TRCSF: Yeah, I think it's classism and not racism. I grew up in an area with poor white folks who hated blacks. I saw their attitude towards blacks and it was horrific - along the lines of dragging them behind pickups because they were black.

If this hurricane had hit where I grew up, the white poor people would have been forgotten as easily as the poor black people (who have not been tied up to pickups and dragged around) were forgotten.

The reason I think it is important to make the distinction between classism of this nature and racism, is that nothing we saw in NO that the impoverished blacks suffered was anything like the horrific treatment blacks would have received where I grew up decades ago. But it is exactly like the treatment poor whites would have received.

So: (1) it is much less pointed and hateful than the sort of racism that we have seen historically, thus the term doesn't really "fit" and (2) poverty seems sufficient to explain it.

It seems like a distionction worth pointing out. We *HAVE* made strides in combatting racism. There is a hell of a long way to go.

That's true with *any* inequality in our society.

Oh, I disagree.

Yes, things have changed since the 1960's, but I think superficially.

Limbaugh's comments indicate that. Instead of bigotry being out in the open, it's only been driven underground. It's not like those people who attacked those little black children for going to desegregated schools have disappeared. It was only forty years ago. Barbara Bush. George W. Bush. Rush Limbaugh.

Kanye West didn't say that George Bush doesn't like black people for no good reason.

There was a Louisiana congressman who, today, said it was a good thing that God finally wiped out that public housing (sounds classist, I know, it's really racist.)

There was a conservative talkshow host who referred to the refugees as "scumbags". I don't think he's talking about the white refugees.

Look at the video of the convention center and superdome and astrodome. New Orleans is ~70% black, but those poor people are ~99% black.

They tried to walk out of New Orleans, but they were turned away by lines of police officers, using police dogs.

It was a mirror image of police meeting the civil rights marchers with police dogs.

The man who's often been called "the spokesman of the right" called the black mayor of New Orleans a n*gger. It doesn't get worse than that. Do you know much about the Rwanda massacre? They used radio talkshow hosts to drum up propaganda in the slaughter of certain ethnic groups. There's little difference.

I'm not trying to minimize the plight of poor whites in the Lake George Disaster. I'm as sympathetic towards the poor as anybody can possibly be. But I think it's a lot worse right now to be poor and black, than poor and white.

As a recent African American entertainer recently said (his or her name escapes me): "After 9-11, we were Americans. Now we're back to being n*ggers.)

hey limbaugh was "just joking" when he said that! just like ann coulter is "just joking" when she says extremely offensive stuff.

Ha. Yeah. And ESPN was just joking when they fired Limbaugh for making racist comments. And police were just joking when they found Limbaugh trying to find a doctor to prescrbe him narcotics, no questions asked.

The man who's often been called "the spokesman of the right" called the black mayor of New Orleans a n*gger. It doesn't get worse than that.

So, I went to the link to find Limbaugh calling Nagin a n1gger.

Are you talking about the ~20 second mp3? ?? I gotta say, that sounds like a slip of the tongue and not a "spokesman of the right" calling Nagin a nigger. He says:"...Mayor Nagir erum Ray Nagin wants Las vegas you know..."

The entire blip is full of him falling over his words, hemming and hahhing. Is this the one you're talking about?

I agree that it is worse in this country to be poor and black than poor and white. But I don't think based upon clips like the link in the first post. I assume the mp3 was what you were referring to.

I gotta say, that sounds like a slip of the tongue and not a "spokesman of the right" calling Nagin a nigger.

Thats not what it sounded like to me at all.
It seemed to me that it was a deliberate and planned "slip of the tongue" intended for the good ole boy audience he caters to.

Not long ago there was a weather man that had a genuine oops when he said it was "Martin Luther Coo.. Uh... KING Day"
Obviously pausing while the wheels in his head turned and he thought "oh my god, what did I just say?"
There was no similar indication from Limbaugh.

Regardless, noone can PROVE it was deliberate, and if his advertisers were offended by it they will pull their support from his show.
I think they bottom line is Limbaugh supporters will truly believe it was a "slip of the tongue" while the rest of the world see's it for what it was. :yuck: